Breeders Cup Classic Preview

All eyes today will be on race 11 at Churchill Downs this evening, the Breeders Cup Classic, featuring the best horses—three-year-old and up—from all over the world. They will be competing at 1 1/4 mi. on dirt for a $6 million dollar purse and boasting rights for horse-of-the-year. The Handicap Wizard is favoring Baffert trained West Coast based on high speed figures relative to the field and a stellar stakes record, including a 2nd place finish in the $16M Pegasus World Cup in January, when he lost to 2017 horse-of-the-year, Gun Runner, and another second place finish in the $10M Dubai World Cup in late March. Two other horses that are expected to contend are Accelerate, who also has early speed, and Mind Your Biscuits. Though regarded as an early presser, Mind Your Biscuits has the strongest late pace figures in the field. The program rates Collected high with a 11.25% win probability, but this mostly has to do with the horse’s 2017 campaign, in which he was dominant. Collected’s 2018 results have not been up to par compared to the horses above.

As a possible long-shot, there are reasons to like lightly raced Axelrod, in that he posted a career best 110 BRIS final figure his last-time out in the Pennsylvania Derby in September, only to come up a length short against prominent three-year old McKenzie out of the Baffert Barn. Axelrod has enough early speed to keep him near the pace, while showing the third best late-pace figures at 14.0% . Going by that metric alone would suggest that he is underpriced at 30-1 on the M/L. A breakdown of the speed figures by E1 and LP are visible in the Handicap Wizard’s soon-to-be released next version, previewed below for the first time. The TOP category signifies the combined results.